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A total of 58 branches have been named in Kent, 45 in East Yorkshire and 77 in the East Midlands.

Six-week public consultations will be held in all affected areas before the final decisions are made, but it is expected that the vast majority of the 180 named will be closed.

The government says cuts are needed as the current 14,000-strong network has been losing £4 million a week.

Though many sub-postmasters were afraid to talk – worried that the Royal Mail would deny them any compensation – some expressed anger, saying customers would lose out from the closures.

Chris Saville, 60, the sub-post master at Great Mongeham in Kent, admitted that his post office lost money.

“But the nearest post office is over a mile away in Mill Hill. And there is not a direct bus connection. The pensioners in the village will suffer.”

Roger Gough, Kent County Council’s member for regeneration, said: “This is a damaging and rushed process, which will cause great harm to Kent’s urban and rural communities.

“It is most important that we clearly demonstrate the knock-on effects that losing these branches will have and we’re asking Kent residents to come forward and help us build that picture.”

Peter Daniel, who has run the Eastwood post office on the outskirts of Nottingham for the last 15 years, said: “We are very sad. We are not just a post office, we are part of the local community. There is a little, old lady who lives round the corner and my wife and I go and read her gas metre for her, because she can’t see too well. Who will do that now?”

Compensation of between £40,000 and £70,000 is being given to all sub-postmasters that see their offices close.

But George Thomas, the general secretary of the National Federation of Sub-Postmasters, said: “This doesn’t go into the pockets of sub-postmasters. They need to use that money to pay redundancies to any staff and to buy back their leases.”

Postwatch, the consumer group, said it agreed with Royal Mail that the network was unsustainable and that cuts were needed.

However, it said it had concerns over some of the branches earmarked for closure in Kent, saying locals will have to travel too far and the closure could hit communities too hard.

It urged customers to use the six-week consultation period to lobby the Post Office if they had concerns.

However, some campaigners warned that six weeks was not long enough for a thorough consultation.

Gordon Lishman, Director General of Age Concern, said: “The fact that the Government and the Post Office are ploughing through the local consultations in six weeks rather than twelve, suggests that decisions may have already been made.”